GREAT Women Project trains technical advisers on gender analysis

The Philippine Commission on Women, through The GREAT Women Project supported by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA), trained 39 technical advisers from national government to become not just trainers but gender mainstreaming coaches of national and local government agencies on the use of major gender analysis tools. The Training of Technical Advisers on Gender Analysis (TOTAGA) for national government is a two-batch training series to further capacitate national government agencies to “advocate gender equality and good economic sense in enterprise development”.

The TOTAGA also called for a synergy for harmonization and synergy in gender-responsive efforts of national and local government agencies. TOTAGA advocated a stronger push to have gender and development advocacy to the top management of each agency.

The first batch of the TOTAGA was held last July 12-15, 2010 at the MERALCO Management and Leadership Development Center (MMLDC) in Antipolo City. Participants were from the national and regional offices of the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), Department of Natural Resources (DENR), Department of Science and Technology (DOST), (TESDA) and PhilHealth. Aside from discussing gender analysis tools, TOTAGA also discussed situationers on the State of Local Economic Development (LED) with Atty. Evelyn Jiz of the Local Governance Support Program for Local Economic Development (LGSP-LED) and the State of Micro-, Small and Medium Enterprises with Ms. Luvy Villanueva as resource persons.

The five major gender analysis tools shared in the training were the Gender Mainstreaming Evaluation Framework (GMEF), Harmonized GAD Guidelines (HGDG), DOST-, DENR- developed gender analysis (GA) tools, and the Social Protection GA tool. The GMEF and HGDG tools identify the level of progress and areas of potential to mainstream gender within a national and a local government agency. The DOST GA tool, titled Assessing the Gender-Responsiveness of DOST Technologies Relevant to Women Microentrepreneurs, examines gender sensitivity of any business venture or enterprise. The DENR’s Gender Analysis Tool for Environment determines the gender-responsiveness in managing the environment and natural resources toward sustaining enterprises.  The social protection gender analysis tool measures the impact and outcome of implementing social protection policies and programs to harmonize economic with social objectives.

Participants expressed that the training “clearly identified possible entry points and partnership-building opportunities to implement gender-responsive policies and programs.” Participating NGAs drafted reentry action plans to apply the gender analysis tools and introduce related gender-responsive interventions for selected agency projects, programs and services.

Ms. Lucy Lazo served as overall facilitator of the TOTAGA. GA tool trainers were PCW Planning Officers Jemelle Millanes (for GMEF), Katherine Vinegas (for HGDG), DENR Economist Roy Tolentino (for Environment GA Tool), DOST Assistant Scientist Blesshie Querijero (for DOST-Developed GA Tool) and PCW Planning Officer Ethel Caasi (for social protection GA tool).

PCW will monitor the application of tools and technical assistance capacities of national government agencies, provide for priority common capacity development needs, and conduct inter-agency top management dialogues to promote gender advocacies.